Clay Christmas Ornaments

I have a "holiday tree". I love the ambiance of a Christmas tree so I decided to keep a small 3 ft. tree up all year and decorate it different each month. I have wanted to do this for years and finally just did it in 2002. I came up with this idea a long time ago before it was the in thing to do. Now I’m in style I guess. I love it! I find little things to decorate it at the thrift store, garage sales or at end of season clearance sales.

Even though I found some really cute small pumpkins and gourds and small leaves for my September fall tree (and at 90+ degrees it hasn’t even come close to feeling like fall), I couldn’t find any Halloween decorations. I love Halloween but I don’t get into the really gory, scary stuff. I decided to make my own Halloween decorations. I used the clay ornament recipe from Dining On A Dime and Not Just Beans.

Mom has some small pumpkin and ghost cookie cutters that she uses for her gingerbread men so I borrowed those and painted them with paints I already had. I will be able to decorate my tree for around $1. (I did find some cute garland that I bought on clearance.)

It’s kind of fun working on the holiday tree and it does bring me joy. I can’t really garden, decorate the house outside for the season (we really get into it!) or do my dried florals at this time in my life so that one little thing does help and is fun being creative with it.

Tawra

This is a fun recipe for the kids to make over the long Thanksgiving weekend.

Clay Christmas Ornaments

4 cups flour 1 cup salt 1 tsp. powdered alum 1 1/2 cups water

Mix ingredients well in a large bowl. If the dough is too dry, work in another tablespoon of water with your hands. The dough can be rolled or molded and can be colored with a few drops of food coloring.

To roll: Roll dough 1/8 inch thick on lightly floured board. Cut with cookie cutters dipped in flour. Insert wire or make hole in top about 1/4 inch down for hanging.

To mold: Shape dough no more than 1/2 inch thick. Bake ornaments on ungreased cookie sheet for 30 minutes in 250° oven. Turn and bake another 1 1/2 hours until hard and dry. Remove and cool. When done, paint and seal with spray varnish. You can lightly sand before painting to make the paint adhere better.

Comments

I love this idea. I made clay ornaments wih my niece and nephew a few years back at Christmas. I thought we would do Christmas themed at the time but they had a whole set of Mickey Mouse cookie cutters so thats what we did. They painted them totally different than I would have….and their litttle tree turned out just perfect…it was just as nice as an adult could have done and they were only 3 and 4 at the time. Great fun, inexpensive, and a great gift for parents from their kidos.